With an affectation of briskness he was far from feeling, Mr. Kemble came down the stairs and joined his daughter in the hall. He had taken pains to draw his hat well over his eyes, anticipating and dreading her keen scrutiny, but, strange to say, his troubled demeanor passed unnoticed. In the interval of waiting Helen\'s thoughts had taken a new turn. "Well, papa," she began, as they passed into the street, "I am curious to know about the sick man. You stayed an age, but all the same I\'m glad I came with you. Forebodings, presentiments, and all that kind of thing seemed absurd the moment I saw Jackson\'s keen, mousing little visage. His very voice is like a ray of garish light entering a dusky, haunted room. Things suggesting ghosts and hobgoblins become ridiculously prosaic, and you are ashamed of yourself and your fears."

"Yes, yes," replied Mr. Kemble, yielding to irritation in his deep perplexity, "the more matter-of-fact we are the better we\'re off. I suppose the best thing to do is just to face what happens and try to be brave."

"Well, papa, what\'s happened to annoy you to-night? Is this sick man going to make you trouble?"

"Like enough. I hope not. At any rate, he has claims which I must meet."

"Don\'t you think you can meet them?" was her next anxious query, her mind reverting to some financial obligation.

"We\'ll see. You and mother\'ll have to help me out, I guess. I\'ll tell you both when we get home;" and his sigh was so deep as to be almost a groan.

"Papa," said Helen, earnestly pressing his arm, "don\'t worry. Mamma and I will stand by you; so will Hobart. He is the last one in the world to desert one in any kind of trouble."

"I know that, no one better; but I fear he\'ll be in deeper trouble than any of us. The exasperating thing is that there should be any trouble at all. If it had only happened before—well, well, I can\'t talk here in the street. As you say, you must stand by me, and I\'ll do the best I can by you and all concerned."

"Oh, papa, there was good cause for my foreboding."

"Well, yes, and no. I don\'t know. I\'m at my wits\' end. If you\'ll be brave and sensible, you can probably do more than any of us."

"Papa, papa, something IS the matter with Hobart," and she drew him hastily into the house, which they had now reached.

Mrs. Kemble met them at the door. Alarmed at her husband\'s troubled face, she exclaimed anxiously, "Who is this man? What did he want?"

"Come now, mother, give me a chance to get my breath. We\'ll close the doors, sit down, and talk it all over."

Mrs. Kemble and her daughter exchanged an apprehensive glance and followed with the air of being prepared for the worst.

The banker sat down and wiped the perspiration from his brow, then looked dubiously at the deeply anxious faces turned toward him. "Well," he said, "I\'m going to tell you everything as far as I understand it. Now I want to see if you two can\'t listen calmly and quietly and not give way to useless feeling. There\'s much to be done, and you especially, Helen, must be in the right condition to do it."

"Oh, papa, why torture me so? Something HAS happened to Hobart. I can\'t endure this suspense."

"Something has happened to us all," replied her father, gravely. "Hobart has acted like a hero, like a saint; so must you. He is as well and able to go about as you are. I\'ve seen him and talked with him."

"He saw you and not me?" cried the girl, starting up.

"Helen, I entreat, I command you to be composed and listen patiently.
Don\'t you know him well enough to be sure he had good reasons—"

"I can\'t imagine a reason," was the passionate reply, as she paced the floor. "What reason could keep me from him? Merciful Heaven! father, have you forgotten that I was to marry him to-day? Well," she added hoarsely, standing before him with hands clinched in her effort at self-restraint, "the reason?"

"Poor fellow! poor fellow! he has not forgotten it," groaned Mr. Kemble. "Well, I might as well out with it. Suppose Captain Nichol was not killed after all?"

Helen sank into a chair as if struck down as Nichol had been himself.
"What!" she whispered; and her face was white indeed.

Mrs. Kemble rushed to her husband, demanding, "Do you mean to tell us that Captain Nichol is alive?"

"Yes; that\'s just the question we\'ve got to face."

"It brings up another question," replied his wife, sternly. "If he\'s been alive all this time, why did he not let us know? As far as I can make out, Hobart has found him in Washington—"

"Helen," cried her father to the trembling girl, "for Heaven\'s sake, be calm!"

"He\'s alive, ALIVE!" she answered, as if no other thought could exist in her mind. Her eyes were kindling, the color coming into her face, and her bosom throbbed quickly as if her heart would burst its bonds. Suddenly she rushed to her father, exclaiming, "He was the sick man. Oh, why did you not let me see him?"

"Well, well!" ejaculated Mr. Kemble, "Hobart was right, poor fellow! Yes, Helen, Captain Nichol is the sick man, not dangerously ill, however. You are giving ample reason why you should not see him yet; and I tell you plainly you can\'t see him till you are just as composed as I am."

She burst into a joyous, half-hysterical laugh as she exclaimed, "That\'s not asking much. I never saw you so moved, papa. Little wonder! The dead is alive again! Oh, papa, papa, you don\'t understand me at all! Could I hear such tidings composedly—I who have wept so many long nights and days over his death? I must give expression to overwhelming feeling here where it can do no harm, but if I had seen him—when I do see him—ah! he\'ll receive no harm from me."

"But, Helen, think of Hobart," cried Mrs. Kemble, in sharp distress.

"Mother, mother, I cannot help it. Albert is alive, ALIVE! The old feeling comes back like the breaking up of the fountains of the great deep. You cannot know, cannot understand; Hobart will. I\'m sorry, SORRY for him; but he will understand. ............